Tough Miles

The amount of mosquitoes here is unreal, I’m being eaten alive and it’s time to camp along the Trans-Siberian Highway. Bring it on.

We left Moscow yesterday, Thursday 17th May, to begin our 6 day journey towards Novosibersk, Russia’s 3rd largest city in Western Siberia. After a full day of easy riding we decided to venture off the road and find a suitable spot for our first night camping in the wild, the moment I have been dreading. After an hour spent riding around fields, mud tracks and gravel roads we still didn’t feel comfortable pitching up. Not wanting to admit defeat we headed down yet another country road and found a small village 2km from the main road. It was very quiet, almost desolate except an old lady doing some gardening. We stopped, removed our crash helmets and approached the lady with our book to show her a picture of a tent. Without being able to speak any English she just smiled and pointed at a patch of grass in front of her house. As we stood there laughing at the prospect of setting up camp millions of mosquitoes surrounded us, and some of the neighbours wandered out to see what was going on. A group of immigrants from Uzbekistan emerged from the shack opposite and told us to come in and sleep inside to avoid the mosquitoes. This situation felt pretty crazy but we accepted their kind offer and rode our bikes through a narrow gate into the backyard, almost pulling down the fence as we squeezed by with the luggage.

We followed them into the run down farm house, where they invited us into a small kitchen for a cup of tea. It was very quiet, and due to the langauge barrier we often sat in silence, but it never felt awkward, just peaceful. The silence was soon broken by another two residents arriving home, this time it was two loud Russians, a tough looking builder and a very drunk fisherman dressed in full camo. They didn’t seem surprised by our presence and were both very welcoming, with the fisherman insisting we got up at 5am for a morning fishing session the following day. Before long we found some common ground knocking back straight vodka and tequila, proper Russian stylee. Dinner was fish in a can, and we brought some Heinz baked beans to the table, which we all shared out of the tin and they seemed to go down a treat. They also gave us some weird potion made with various herbs to stop the police smelling alcohol on your breath the next day.

As the sun was setting they said “let’s go” and we all walked down a gravel path to see where they are building a huge house over-looking a beautiful lake. The drunk fisherman seemed like a bit of crazy Nutter, he stuffed a handful of dried fish into my pocket and then stood at the edge of the lake screaming out something in Russian, trying to make us do the same! I thought to myself, if I was camping nearby and saw him I would have been petrified! After watching the sunset and having a look around the building site we ventured back to the farm-house to prepare for bed. We shared the floor space in their large bedroom, where they provided us with an inflatable mattress and an old sofa. It was a hot sweaty night, and due to the mosquitoes we decided to sleep in our motorbike trousers and hoodies. I found it hard to sleep using my dirty motorbike jacket as a pillow, and hearing the mosquitoes doing laps of the room. I also needed the toilet in the middle of the night, but I didn’t want to disturb the rest of the room, and the toilet was a hole in the ground at the end of the garden.

The following morning we were grateful not to have had a 5am wake up call by the fisherman, and as we packed up Pete got covered in dust folding up the inflatable mattress. Despite the incredible hospitality and unique experience we had been given they wouldn’t accept any money for our stay, so we just tucked a 500rubs (£10) note under an old tin in the bedroom as we left. We didn’t bother putting on all our gear, and decided to it would be easier to ride out of the garden in just a t-shirt and stop down the road to re-group.

Home is on the bike.

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